Saturday, 29 November 2008

On the 28th of November 2008, the Ghana News Agency reported from Ho, the Volta Regional capital, that the former president had said that: “"Everywhere people are shouting for a change. An NDC victory wind is blowing," said former President Rawlings. He accused the New Patriotic Party (NPP) administration of dissipating funds, amassing wealth, while the ordinary man suffered from want of basic needs.”

My reaction: I do hope to God that Professor Atta Mills will have the courage to ensure that the bad old days when corruption under the NDC regime reached its apogee, does not return, if he becomes Ghana’s next president - for no future regime will survive its full tenure: if it disappoints ordinary Ghanaians and is as corrupt as the present ruling elite has been, thus far.

Ghanaian democracy as we know it, will not survive if we continue to see outrageous acts of corruption, such as that fraudulent so-called VALCO/International Aluminum Partners sale and purchase agreement, which was railroaded through parliament by the presidency - just to further the personal wealth-creation agenda of the few powerful and tribal supremacist crooks, who dominate this regime so completely.

There are many of the “never-do-well-spongers” from yesteryear, who lived off the fat of the land at the people’s expense, during the tenure of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), who are waiting in the wings anxiously - looking forward again to living in state properties for free, buying vehicles for peanuts from the Customs, Excise and Preventative Service (CEPS) vehicle auctions to sell on for fat profits, get contracts to build some of our infrastructure even when they don’t qualify, etc. etc..

Well, some of us are also waiting in the wings, determined to be as critical of the next NDC regime under Professor Mills, as we have been of the present NPP incompetents, throughout their tenure - if there should be a return to the crookedness that made Ghanaians vote the NDC out of power in December 2000: and for which reason they might also vote the present crooks ruling Ghana, out of power, this December, too.

With respect, we are serving notice to the former president and his friends that those of us who have resisted the present crooks in power all these past years (and at great cost emotionally - in terms of strained relations with some family members - and financially too: in terms of deliberately blocked opportunities, because we refuse to sell our conscience!), and have been critical of the current ruling regime consistently, will resist the next government too, whichever party wins the presidency - if the next president turns out to be a J.A. Kufuor Mk11.

Some of us loathe the present incumbent, our “Hypocrite-in-Chief”, President Kufuor, precisely because throughout his tenure, he made common cause with those of his tribal Chiefs whose secret agenda is to return us to the dark days of slavery: and impose the mostly unsavoury wolves-in-sheep's-clothing progeny, of the pre-colonial ruling elites on us again, by stealth.

We have no intention of tolerating a similar kind of president ever again - and we certainly will not tolerate Professor Mills becoming a J.A.Kufour MK11. We will not sit down and watch him turn nepotism into a fine art – and flood the public sector with his favourites: by filling the plumiest positions in it with members of his family clan.

We will resist him if tries to impose any of his tribal Chiefs on us - and if he was to attempt to turn his family into Ghana’s wealthiest family clan: with a combined net worth in the stratosphere and valued in zillions of dollars, we will definitely force him out of power through people power. Period.

Ghana’s political parties and its political class must understand clearly that not all Ghanaians are the “My-party-my-tribe-right-or-wrong” myrmidon-types: who are too thick to think and too blind to see, what is going on in our homeland Ghana. Is it not their uncritical and sycophantic support of political parties that encourages our political class to continue worshipping at the “cult-of-the-mediocre” with such fervour?

We are all aware that our country has ended up becoming more or less an elected dictatorship: largely because the 1992 constitution was specifically designed to enable a military dictatorship morph into an elected civilian regime - so that the dictators of old could continue ruling Ghana with the same extensive powers they had when they were military dictators.

Our present Hypocrite-in-Chief, President Kufuor’s eight years of tyranny-by-stealth, has, as Frema Busia's brilliant eloquence has shown us all, finally exposed that fraudulent document for what it truly is - an enabling document specifically designed as a legal-cloak to provide a comfort-zone to enable clever and hypocritical tyrants to hold us to ransom, with impunity.

In the final analysis, just where has that landed our country today, dear reader? Today, are we not the favourite African playground of foreign commercial interests - whose ever-grateful governments say we are the star of Africa: because we are led by Africa’s leading stooge for neocolonialism and a self-seeking super-lackey of Western commercial interests? Hmmm, Ghana - eyeasem oo! Who needs leaders afflicted with the "house-nigger-mentality" virus, I ask, dear reader?

Let our political class understand clearly that there still exist Ghanaians who do have values - and are independent-minded patriots who really do love their country. Patriotism is not something some of us merely pay lip service to - we are actually prepared to die defending the peace, unity and stability of our country.

So let those of them who think they will turn Ghana into a Kenya after the elections, and let our country burn because their dreams of coming to power did not materialize, quickly revise their notes. They would be far better off rather working hard to ensure that the election is not rigged, in the first place.

Whatever the hopes and fears of our former president are, let him remember the popular saying that the price of freedom is eternal vigilance. Let him and his party be vigilante during the counting of the ballot papers after the polls close this December. We will simply not tolerate a resort to violence by any political party after the December 2008 elections. Period. A word to the wise…

Friday, 28 November 2008

Opanin Johnny Blukoo-Allotey, in your article entitled, “The ‘New’ Spintext Road; A Chance To Get It Right!” that was posted on the 28th November, 2008 features web page of www.ghanaeb.com, you say: "We shouldn’t hear; as an engineer who worked on the design of Tetteh-Quarshie lamented; “we had cash constraints”.

You then go on that "Government must find the cash to build this road and make it function as it should. This road should take us into the future. Those involved in its design and construction should be able to boast to their grandchildren that they were part of it!"

My reaction: Perfect project to put out to international tender to get a good contractor (who must be made to work with a Ghanaian joint-venture partner and local professionals, as part of the terms of the contract!) who wants a self-financed build-operate-and-transfer road project in Africa from which it can earn 25 years of tax-free toll revenue.

If we finance some of our major infrastructural projects that way, we will not have to worry about such national assets deteriorating because they are poorly maintained - and our leaders’ penchant for getting kickbacks that result in examples of poor quality road projects will quickly become a thing of the past.

By definition, a self-financed infrastructural project executed by a construction firm, which will also operate it in order to recoup its investment, is one executed to the highest standards - to save money that would otherwise be expended in needless maintenance and repairs: on a road it needs to keep open round the clock to earn it revenue from toll charges!

Incidentally, I live near a classic example of a poorly-executed infrastructural project - being the atrocious quality of that portion of the Accra-Mallam road that I see daily, when I go for my regular evening walk in the part of McCarthy Hill where I live.

Alas, it has countless numbers of broken and cracked drainage covers, endless metres of pavement railings meant to stop pedestrians from falling into the big uncovered gutters lining the access road to houses off the Accra-Cape Coast road, and a central reservation cement surface that is already begining to crack.

Thursday, 27 November 2008

Opanin, bully for you that at least you have regular work to do in faraway America - and are able to do an honest day's work every day: instead of dealing in illicit drugs like cocaine, as some of our country folk there are wont to do.

One small point though, Sir - just where do you load your rubbish from everyday to make your deliveries to the waste-to-energy plant in Ohio, which you speak so highly of?

Presumably, you do not have to cross the border daily to go all the way to Canada - in order to bring the owners of that American waste-to-energy power plant in Ohio, Canadian garbage, to use to generate power for their American customers?

I guess its pointless asking you if it hasn't occurred to you yet, that the clever Americans who built the plant that you deliver garbage to every day in Ohio, made sure that they had sufficient waste that was also available close enough by, to have hardworking guys like you, to be in a position, to make daily deliveries of the required garbage to their Ohio plant?

Don't you think it slightly odd, that in our case, the geniuses who are the promoters of the Kumasi plant, failed to ensure that they had sufficient garbage available locally that could be delivered daily to feed their plant too, to enable it work at full capacity - before actually going ahead to expend money to build that lunatic folly?

I take it, O Genius, that since you are such an obviously objective fellow, you are definitely not one of those tiresome "My-party-my-tribe-right-or-wrong" myrmidon-types - who wear blinkers permanently and are too thick to think and too blind to see: and whose blind support for our political parties, encourages our political class to continue worshiping daily, at the cult-of-the-mediocre?

Well, it will be most interesting to see what Green Peace Canada makes of this outrage - in which a number of clever Canadians secure a deal with clueless African politicians to dump dangerous waste in a poor developing nation: when someone brings it to their attention, as well as to the attention of the Canadian media, with the click of a computer mouse.

Massa, in this day and age, it is absurd for carpetbaggers from foreign parts to assume that they can come and engage in sharp practice in some backwater in Africa - and get away with it. In the Web 2.0 age, that is wishful thinking, believe me. If only the crooks who rule us understood that bald fact of modern-day life - they would spare us all such pure nonsense on bamboo stilts!

Has it not struck that well-educated buffoon Maxwell Kofi Jumah that it was only yesterday that another group of crooked Canadians walked away from their obligations here - after taking out as much gold as they possibly could at Bonte: and left a hell-on-earth patch of land for the hapless inhabitants of Bonte: to try and survive as best they could, on their once-fertile farmlands that had been degraded so terribly by the surface gold mining operations of the Canadian company, that it will not support any farming on it, any time soon, and for decades to come?

Nana Biakoye, O, Massa, why? I (and many others too!) probably loathe the NPP more than you do - but can you tell an ignoramus like me, what exactly was the point of your piece? The concerned person, who pointed your astonishing piece out to me, actually described it, as, quote: "...such a hate-filled diatribe." End of quote.

I refer to your article entitled: “NPP; Stop Skating On Thin Ice” (which, incidentally, makes you look suspiciously like a plagiarist - as a large chunk of it is the same as the title of one of my old articles!), which appeared in the features web page of www.ghanaweb.com on 27th November, 2008.

Massa, surely, if you wanted to convince the independent-minded Ghanaians whose votes will make a difference between victory and defeat for Professor Mills, and who have still not made up their minds as to who to vote for as president in this December’s election (even at this late hour!), it would have been far better for you to have concentrated on the issues that matter to ordinary people - and showed them how the good professor would resolve their many difficulties if they voted for him to become Ghana's next president?

Would it not have been more beneficial to the cause of the good professor if you had used your opportunity to convince people like me, for example, that he would seek to create a more equitable society in Ghana than the elitist NPP has done thus far: having succeeded in turning our nation into one in which, today, there are such huge disparities in wealth?

Massa, would it not have been far more effective if you had tried to convince the independent-minded voters that Professor Mills will ensure that his family and that of his political appointees do not use their political connections to amass fortunes during his tenure - and stop them from repeating the unfortunate example many say our current president and the greedy and tribalistic crowd that surrounds him, have set, in our public life?

Finally, Massa, have you never heard of the phrase "their step-children” to describe the children who previously-married individuals who come together when they remarry, bring into their new union? Surely, if Nana Akufo-Addo's wife isn't running for president, her character isn't an issue at all, for ordinary Ghanaians, is it?

Has she informed you that she intends to set up the NPP equivalent of the 31st December Women’s Movement: and set about using state resources to grow it, if her husband were to become Ghana’s next president, by any chance - in which case why haven’t you shared this confidence with all of us: as that is a matter that would certainly be of concern to ordinary Ghanaians?

Massa, although I am a nobody, may I humbly suggest that you are a little more charitable when you write about the spouses of politicians who are running for office - so that God will smile a little more kindly on you too? Please, leave out such insults - especially to the self-respecting spouses of politicians: who themselves, aren't running for any office. Haba!

Presumably, one would be more than right in saying that you are one of the few human beings on the surface of the planet Earth, without any character-blemish at all, personally?

Well, I freely admit to being full of faults as a human being: as well as being a super-buffoon, a world-class ignoramus and a semi-literate of the very worst kind - to save you from having to wear yourself out, unnecessarily, heaping insults on poor old me, too: since that seems to be your favourite game!

Massa, I am sure that there are a few independent-minded voters, who will say to themselves, that Professor Mills, whom all Ghanaian acknowledge to be a good and decent fellow, and one of the few honest men in Ghanaian politics, today, doesn't deserve supporters like you.

Well, hopefully, in addition to your many other ‘virtues’, one hopes that you are not also one of the many "My-party-my-tribe-right-or-wrong" myrmidons: who wear blinkers permanently and are too thick to think and too blind to see - and whose blind and unthinking support of political parties, encourages our political class to continue worshipping at the cult of the mediocre?

Wednesday, 26 November 2008

According to the Chronicle newspaper (as reported in the general news web page of www.ghanaweb.com of 25th November, 2008) Mr. Maxwell Kofi Jumah, who is a deputy minister (of local government, science and environment and member of parliament for Asokwa constituency in the Ashanti Region, no less!) has: “... hinted that the country would import garbage to augment the new technology of transforming waste to energy, which is scheduled to take place early next year. According to him, the project, which would cost the country $250 million after completion, will provide Kumasi and its environs 50 megawatts of energy for the next fifteen years..."

Is this perhaps yet another classic example of naïve African politicians being hoodwinked by crafty foreigners, because of their ignorance? It is so typical of the incompetents into whose hands Nkrumah’s Ghana has now fallen - whose short-term thinking makes them think that making money (regardless of the negative societal and environmental implications!) is everything: as long as it boosts our GDP.

How can any regime that cared about the health of its citizens possibly think about importing waste from outside its borders? Is this not an egregious example of unacceptable risk-taking?

Why imperil the natural environment as well as risk the health of ordinary people so needlessly - by going into a deal that depends solely on the goodwill and honesty of foreigners (who probably can't believe their luck!): who might, or might not be, profiting from exporting waste considered too dangerous to store in their own home countries?

Why, did Mr. Maxwell Kofi Jumah not hear of the tragedy that befell the Ivory Coast not too long ago - when many innocent Ivorian citizens were killed because they came into contact with toxic waste dumped there by a group of selfish and greedy individuals: who allowed it to be dumped there, because they benefitted from that outrage personally?

Is it the case, perhaps, that there are also such callous and greedy individuals doing the same thing here too - because they too will be benefitting financially from this monstrous, foolish and shortsighted decision?

Does Mr. Maxwell Kofi Jumah not see that this nation is literally drowning in filth? Is there not enough waste generated in our country to feed the said plant? Could waste from Accra (which apparently finds it difficult to find landfill sites!), and elsewhere from this country that abounds in mega-filth, not be put into 40ft containers and loaded unto freight trains and trucks to be sent to Kumasi to feed the confounded plant? Why take such an unnecessary risk by importing waste from elsewhere?

Can this quintessence of the naïve and ignorant African politician tell us precisely what kind of advanced emission-control design the plant has? Can he assure the residents of Kumasi that they are amongst the most modern and technically up-to date in the world - and that they will not be exposed to dioxin and furan, under any circumstances: both of which many consider serious health hazards?

Will he also tell us what stringent new and world-class environmental regulations (comparable to that in nations like Canada and Germany for similar municipal incineration plants!), which our woefully under-resourced environmental protection agency (EPA) has put into place - to ensure that dioxin and furan are never ever emitted by that plant to endanger the health of the inhabitants of our second city?

Finally, is he also aware of the fact that a number of EU medical associations (which also included cross-discipline experts such as toxicologists and environmental chemists) which together represent over 30,000 doctors throughout the EU, expressed their concerns about incinerator particle emissions - and the absence of specific fine and ultrafine particle-size monitoring or in-depth industry and government epidemiological studies of those minute and invisible incinerator particle-size emissions, to the European Parliament, as recently as June 2008?

Monday, 24 November 2008

How frightfully meh! Hmmm, Ghana – eyeasem oo: God give me patience. Massa, you begin by saying: “Boss, permit me to say that you are not making sense.” Unquote. Thank you so much, for the compliment. You, on the other hand, make a great deal of sense to me!

Opanin, with respect, are sure you have actually read my piece? May I humbly suggest that you do so - before you jump to all the wrong conclusions: even if it is written by an ignoramus and a fool like the semi-literate Kofi Thompson? Who in heaven’s name mentioned Rawlings’ name in the context you speak of, Sir? Please leave me out of your obsessions!

Massa, you then go on to say: “We will not get a holy government to govern Ghana. NPP is filled with Ghanaians and we all know that as citizens, our attitude is bad, thus the reason we are not making fast progress.” Unquote.

What an extraordinary thing to say! Why, are you a cynic, too, in addition to all your other virtues? Massa, please speak for yourself – if your “attitude” is “bad”: and if you think that integrity is a concept that applies only to angels in heaven. Heavens above!

Please reread my article – and if I may be permitted (by you: who is so obviously such an erudite scholar and world-class philosopher!), to make a humble suggestion: please do not tread where angles fear to tread, Opanin!

Finally, let me admit freely that I am an ignoramus, a buffoon and an imbecile – to save you the trouble of insulting me: and if that makes you happy. I certainly hope that you are not one of those “My-party-my-tribe-right-or-wrong” myrmidon-types - who wear blinkers permanently and are too thick to think and too blind to see the reality of life in the hellhole, which those who can see and can think, say our country has now become!

If those who you say want to break up our country succeed (God forbid!), they will have an ignoramus and a nobody like me to contend with - as I shall qualify for an Asante passport, too. Massa, there are many like me in our homeland Ghana - who don't make any noise, but are prepared to die fighting to keep Ghana a united and democratic unitary republic.

The fact of the matter is that tribal supremacists exist in all the tribes in Ghana - but luckily for the enterprise Ghana, wherever they are found, they are always only a small minority of bigots amongst their fair-minded fellow-tribesmen and women. Tribal -supremacists in Ghanaians are really no different from those odious white supremacist racists of the Western world, who incredibly think that all people of colour are inferior beings.

Tribal supremacists in Ghana can never divide our country by carving it up - no matter how hard the arrogant morons try! Do you not see that there is virtually no extended family in Ghana that is not a family clan of diverse ethnicity - united through blood-ties and by marriage?

All ordinary Ghanaians (apart from the few tribal supremacists in our midst, who, sadly, are lumbered with a serf-mentality that makes them the supine puppets of those who seek to return us to the dark days of slavery in our pre-colonial past!) think of themselves as the citizens of the Ghanaian nation-state – not of the tribes they originally hail from.

So please relax – Ghana will never break up: no matter what our "Hypocrite-in-Chief" Kufuor and the despicable ones amongst his tribal chiefs do or say! Massa, who in this country did not respect Otumfuo Opoku Ware 11 in Ghana whiles he was alive?

Was it not because he was wise enough to understand that precisely because of the weight of history behind his position, he always had to keep a low profile - to help maintain the unity of our country? Who did not mourn the passing of that great man - who will go down in history as the greatest of the modern-day Asantehenes, ever?

Massa, there can be no Ghana, without Asante - and there can certainly be no Asante without a Republic of Ghana: which will remain a unitary republic in which there exist no kingdoms (certainly not of the state-within-a-state variety!), till the very end of time, the delusions of some of Ghana’s tiresome publicity-seeking traditional rulers, and their crooked tribal supremacist promoters amongst our political class, notwithstanding! Period.

Your quote: “…Wow from your comment or errhhh thesis it seems Ghana is ruled by marauding gang intent on sucking the best of the country & repressing all who disagree with them. If that is the case why hasn't Frema been jailed, killed off in an accident or even just muzzled. She begun making these allegations more than a year ago & if Ghana is as she wants us to believe then she shouldn't be around making more noises...” End of quotation

Massa, the long and short of it, is that Fremaa Busia's very clever enemies, made a smart strategic decision. They concluded, correctly, that it was far better to leave her alive and discredit her (by the simple ruse of slandering her by calling her a "fruit-and-nut-case"!), than to provide eager Ghanaian conspiracy theorists with years of endless speculation that she was murdered to help hide the truth from Ghanaians.

Ever heard of the miracle of the hand of God that daily guides and protects the honest and the meek - who are thrown into the nest of Vipers?

Opanin, with respect, do open your eyes a little wider, please. In any case, time will tell – although, sadly, some of those currently in power, who never heed the warning contained in the wise Ghanaian saying: "No condition is permanent" and constantly delude themselves that they are invincible, forget that pithy fact of life.

Massa, the fact of the matter is that the Ghana of today is not a nation you can "Chop small" as a Lebanese crook once famously said: as he airily and contemptuously dismissed our country as a land of fools - much to that wealthy foreigner-moron's regret later on!

For those of us with long memories, it is astonishing how remarkably similar today’s goings-on, are, to the Kalabule-era - prelude to the events of the 4th June 1979 military uprising.

The powerful and completely amoral crooks of that era, driven by the unfathomable greed that led them to attempt to own practically all our nation’s wealth as quickly as they possibly could, also felt pretty invincible - and were as arrogant as today’s amoral crowd: who dominate the current regime so completely. Just where did that finally land some of them, Massa?

Today’s crowd, whose greed also knows no bounds, at all, constantly tell us things that rub salt into our collective wound: when they tell those who chide them that they are “envious” and “lazy” (and if perchance you recall your history of the French revolution, Queen Marie-Antoinette of France too, was just as insensitive about the plight of the ordinary French subjects: then suffering terribly in her husband’s realm!).

What today’s amoral crowd ruling our country forget, however, is that we are not all driven by the kind of greed that makes some to put aside all notions of common decency, in their pursuit of wealth. Such arrogance and insensitivity, only puts them beyond the pale - as far as honest but simple folk who treasure their good name more than tainted wealth, are concerned!

Yes, they may have succeeded in lying their way to power and holding on to it through endless dissimulation, whiles successfully sending their personal net worth to stratospheric heights in the dizzyingly short space of eight short years, too - however, if truth be told, who, but those tiresome and clueless “My-party-my-tribe-right-or-wrong” myrmidon-types, who wear blinkers permanently: and are too thick to think and too blind to see, really respects them, Massa?

Quote: "So do these things happen under Kufour? How come the media has never been able to pick any of them? How come that none of the human rights activists ever picked them?" End of quotation.

Massa, why the surprise? Do you not know that this is a nation full of moral cowards - who will never lift a finger to go to the help of brave souls like Fremaa Busia: who stand up against the tyrants we elect to rule us every four years in the elected tyranny masquerading as a constitutional democracy?

You question the media's strange silence. Why, do you not know that large sections of the supposedly free Ghanaian media, the fourth pillar of government in true democracies, who ought to be society's watchdogs, have sold their consciences to our political class (across the spectrum!), and are now the guard-dogs protecting the vital interests of the few powerful and tribalistic crooks who dominate our political class?

Just why do you think that online news websites such as www.ghanaweb.com are so popular with discerning Ghanaians, both locally and overseas - who are so fed up with the never-ending spin they have to put up with, with out traditional media?Massa, why do you think that Fremaa Busia is suffering the same kind of abuse of her human rights that those who were penned in the Gulags, which the Soviet communists used to repress dissidents, suffered from?

Today, is that sane, decent, brave and stunningly beautiful young woman (who so obviously loves her country that she is even prepared to risk her life for it!), not being slandered by the powerful and crooked Mafioso, which she spurned – and who have declared her a nutcase: just to enable them hide their shameful and outrageous behaviour?

Did Stalin and Co. not also label dissidents as psychiatric cases - and dump them in mental asylums to rot away: many for the rest of their natural lives? Massa, today's clever tyrants use very subtle methods to oppress their critics - unlike yesterday's tyrants who were more upfront about their contempt for democracy.

There are many Ghanaians who have come to the rather painful conclusion that President Kufuor is the most hypocritical leader we have ever had the misfortune of electing into the high office he now occupies.

That quintessence of an African stooge for neo-colonialism and lackey of Western commercial interests, our "Hypocrite-in-Chief", is more Catholic than the Pope - and is leading a regime busy asset-stripping Ghana, in one opaque privatisation deal after another: even as privatisation has become a dirty word in the nation that more or less invented it, the UK.

On top of all that, he has also succeeded in dividing our country along tribal lines, like no other Ghanaian leader has - imposing his megalomaniac tribal Chiefs on our country, a unitary Republic.

Personally, and like many other decent and independent-minded Ghanaians, I do not care one jot how many members of his own tribe this "Kokofu-football" superstar appoints to positions in the public sector: as long as they are qualified - because they are all Ghanaian citizens too. So that is not an issue for people like me.

However, as a patriotic Ghanaian and a "de-tribalised" nationalist, who believes in the enterprise Ghana, I do care passionately and deeply resent, his use of the machinery of state, to promote the treasonable ambitions of some of his tribal chiefs – pride-filled and short-sighted men, driven by unfathomable greed: whose overweening ambitions pose a real threat to the stability and cohesion of our homeland Ghana.

How can anyone who truly seeks to create a meritocracy in a 21st century African nation-state such as ours, possibly help to promote the revival of feudalism in Nkrumah’s Ghana, I ask? Why, do they want to turn ordinary people into serfs - forever dominated by inadequate men and women: some with the IQ's of morons, who owe their leadership positions in society solely to inherited privilege? Pure nonsense on bamboo stilts!

The issues Fremaa Busia raises in her crusade against the dark tribal-supremacist forces in the presidency go to the very heart of what plaques our nation - the fact that we are ruled by men largely without honour who are basically not trustworthy individuals in their private lives: and should never be allowed to guide the affairs of any nation that is a society underpinned by common decency.

That is the tragedy of our country, Massa - and that is why we have now become a nation full of "My-party-my-tribe-right-or-wrong" myrmidon-types, who wear blinkers permanently and are too thick to think and too blind to see the horrors going on today: as our beloved mother Ghana is brutally gang-raped by philanderers who are also unabashed misogynists.

Massa, there are many in this country, who will tell you that Fremaa Busia’s revelations are veritable floodlights that shine through the miasma that has enveloped Ghanaian politics, like nothing else has done, since the present incompetent crowd lied their way into power in 2000!

The even bigger tragedy for our country is that the present incompetents will succeed in lying their way back into power again - due to the foolishness and shortsightedness of all the parties in opposition.

If the opposition parties continue as they are, rather than coming together quickly (even at this late hour!) and making a strong-willed and competent northerner (because it ought to be the turn of northerners to assume the presidency, too, now!), like Dr. Edward Mahama, their presidential candidate, with the brilliant and well-spoken Ms. Hanna Tetteh as his vice presidential candidate (of say a new United Peoples Democratic Congress - or whatever confounded name they choose!), they will wake up to a rude awakening, on the morning after the December 7th elections.

It is hard to fathom, why, rather than regard themselves as the progressives in Ghanaian politics who ought to unite to beat the neo-conservative crooks now ruling us, they choose to continue deluding themselves that they can win power alone as single parties – an impossibility against a determined incumbent regime with no scruples whatsoever, dominated by a few powerful and tribalistic crooks, fearful of the many skeletons in their cupboard-of-many-sins, coming to light, were they to loose power in December 2008. Pity.

Saturday, 22 November 2008

Opanin, your article entitled: “One More Reason Why The NPP Must Go!", which appeared in the features web page of www.ghanaweb.com, on Saturday, 22 November 2008, makes very interesting reading, indeed!

Massa, believe me, there is enough wealth in our country, today, to make every Ghanaian citizen have a good quality of life - and have it now: not tomorrow. Yet, there are millions of poor and hard-up Ghanaians who struggle daily to survive and to make ends meet in Ghana today, simply because we have allowed an unjust and unequal (dog-eat-dog) society, in terms of equality of opportunity, to evolve in Ghana.

Today, ours is a society in which the politically well-connected, who are showered daily with ample opportunities that others do not have, have the effrontery to label their fellow compatriots (who exist without any opportunities ever coming their way, throughout their existence in the hellhole that Ghana has today become), as “lazy” people - and still manage to get away with that affront to common decency. Why so, you might wonder, dear reader?

Well, it is because our nation is full of world-class moral cowards: too cowed by the ruthless hypocrites now ruling our nation, to speak up on behalf of the disadvantaged - in a nation in which such huge disparities in wealth (most of it fuelled by corruption and the crime-riddled international cocaine trade), persists.

Massa, ever since the overthrow of Nkrumah in 1966, we have been ruled mostly by people with an elitist worldview: veritable bean-counters who know the price of everything under the African sun, but the value of absolutely nothing, of worth, in life on the surface of God’s blessed planet, Earth. Their sole aim, on a daily basis, is to send their personal net worth into the stratosphere: preferably through secret joint-ventures with foreign carpetbaggers from the neo-colonialist powers.

It has therefore always been in their personal interest to create a political and economic environment in our country, in which a powerful and greedy few prosper mightily - whiles the rest of their compatriots end up in penury: as part of the collateral damage caused by the ruthless exploitation of their country’s wealth. A case in point is the glaring difference in outcomes that South Africa and Ghana have experienced in the exploitation of their deposits of gold.

For, whereas South Africa has built cities like Johannesburg on the back of its gold production, the history of Ghana’s gold mining industry, is littered with examples of hell-on-earth degraded patches that blot the face of its landmass - such as environmental pollution hotspots like Bonte, Prestea and Obuasi.

Massa, the process of governance, pared down to its essentials, for these callous individuals, is rule by an elite: that grabs every opportunity that comes its way - to enable them make zillions of hard currency in kickbacks and sundry rip-offs, whiles their nation is impoverished as it is ruthlessly exploited by clever foreigners.

These foreigners are enticed into our country with a cornucopia of tax-breaks: and they work in close collaboration with their local elite collaborators, those stooges for neo-colonialism and the lackeys of Western commercial interests, to gang-rape Mother Ghana.

They do not care one jot about the results of their actions on their fellow human beings and on the natural environment - otherwise, how can those well-educated imbeciles even begin to think of tearing down the Atewa Mountain Range rain forest?

Why, does every little primary school child in this country not know that that biodiversity hotspot contains billions of dollars in yet-to-discovered medicinal plants and other green wealth-generating possibilities, as well as sustainable bio-resources for rural dwellers in particular to harvest - and which future generations of our compatriots can also prosper from?

The outcome sought by those whose view of the nature of society is an elitist one, is what you describe so well in your article - which is jam-packed with the most egregious examples of the rip-off of our country, in your long list contained in that sad litany of woes.

That is precisely where those mostly tribalistic and materialistic philistines, have landed us: a hellhole in which the “haves” can only prosper at the expense of the “have-nots” and our homeland Ghana.

To help them achieve their collective goal, have they not toiled hard, day and night, and spent zillions to assemble that awesome army of tiresome “My-party-my-tribe-right-or-wrong” myrmidons that follow political parties with such lunatic passion - who wear blinkers permanently and are too thick to think and too blind to see, as their powerbases, to help them reach that repugnant end that they all seek for themselves?

That is why, Opanin, daily, across the airwaves of FM radio stations up and down our country, we constantly have to put up with those tiresome buffoons and sycophantic serial phone-callers - forever phoning into current affairs discussion programmes, to sing their masters’ praises, almost always off-key (because they are so tone-deaf and impervious to reason!).

Who hasn't ever been shocked by the warped thinking they often display? Do they ever cease to astonish the decent and independent-minded Ghanaian citizen, with their inconsistencies and their illogical reasoning - that forever seeks to justify today's obscenities with the fact that they also occurred yesterday?

Question is: Why on earth do these world-class morons think we voted yesterday's masters of the universe, out of power, I ask, dear reader? They are the moronic-fringe in a cast of idiots who are the political equivalent of cannon fodder: zombies who exist for the sole purpose of being led down the garden path by politicians who have their eyes focused firmly on the main chance: pole position in Ghanaian politics.

They are a vital and necessary evil, which plays an important part in the strategy of the cynics - ever-willing supine foot soldiers, who enable the selfish and dishonest crooks amongst our political class, to pole-dance their way up the symbolic greasy-pole of power: after the poor blind fools have gorged themselves silly, fed daily on a diet of lies and empty promises, by the dissimulating rogues amongst our political class.

So just what makes you think that the party that will replace the powerful and tribalistic crooks in power today (into whose hands Nkrumah's Ghana has now sadly fallen!), will be any different from the present shambles of a regime - one deliberately trumpeted as Africa's success story by foreign leaders with an agenda of their own, from the developed world?

Massa, only the clueless actually believe them. For, they are just clever self-seekers, who are simply anxious to find as many pliable African leaders as they possibly can to do business with, at a time when the West must find reliable alternative sources to Middle Eastern oil and natural gas: ditto a time when the EU has to find pliable alternatives to ensure that Russia too does not have a monopoly over Europe’s energy supplies: which it could use to strangle Europe at a time of crisis.

Massa, what we eagerly await today, is the 21sth century civilian equivalent of the 4th June, 1979 military uprising. For, now, more than ever, when oil and natural gas revenues will start flowing in earnest within the next decade it is important to have leaders whose mindset doesn't make them stooges for foreign powers and the lackeys of Western commercial interests - who understand that Ghana must follow the example of Venezuela: not Trinidad and Tobago, as our "Hypocrite-in-Chief" seeks to force down our throats.

To benefit fully from our oil and natural gas deposits, we must nationalize those bourgeoning new industries (our oil and natural gas industry i.e.) : so that their revenues can be used to transform Ghanaian society into the African equivalent of the egalitarian societies of Scandinavia.

We must pay the foreign oil companies fair compensation and rid ourselves permanently, of their baleful influence in our politics, and seize control of that diminishing source of wealth (and we must learn the formula for dealing with that from Venezuela, too - not the Western and Caribbean nations that the clueless crowd currently mismanaging our nation's wealth, have approached thus far!).

It is vital to ensure that Ghanaians, not the fat-cat shareholders of foreign oil and natural gas companies, are the only ones to benefit in any significant way, from God's gift meant to give Ghanaians a second opportunity to transform our now-divided society (after the unfortunate demise of Nkrumah's regime - thanks largely to the CIA and other Western intelligence agencies: and our local stooges for neocolonialism!). Period.

We must use that gift of providence to create a caring and sharing society in which we all have access to good quality world-class education (free to the gifted who cannot afford it, no matter how poor their families might be relatively), good quality housing available for rental at affordable rates to those who cannot presently afford to own their own homes, and funding for all social entrepreneurs with brilliant ideas that benefit society generally and benefits its core group-players financially and materially.

We can let the Ghanaian nation-state issue the government of China with sovereign bonds as our up-front payment of capital and running costs for joint-ventures between the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) and the best-resourced state-owned Chinese oil companies on a 70/30 per cent basis in GNPC ‘s favour.

The crooks amongst those who rule us today, will never favour such deals because they make no room for their confounded (I would rather own 1 per cent of a billion-dollar company, than be a 100 per cent owner of a 100 million dollar company, to paraphrase our "Hypocrite-in-Chief”!) special purpose offshore vehicles, which they use in their secret partnerships with those foreign carpetbaggers whom they sell our state-owned assets to: assets built with the blood, sweat and tears of ordinary working Ghanaians. Yes, those of us who love her must shed tears indeed, for Mother Ghana, Opanin.

Friday, 21 November 2008

Massa, perhaps you forget that one either believes in democrac, or one doesn't? You must also not forget that the 1992 Constitution was tailor-made to enable a military dictatorship morphe successfully into a democratically elected regime - and maintain the extensive powers it had enjoyed as a dictatorship.

It was definitely not designed with the objective of satisfying the desire of grassroots people to have the right to elect those local government officials, whose actions directly affect their quality of life, on a daily basis, in mind.

Power, it is said, corrupts. Nothing shows the wisdom contained in that saying, more than the about-turn made by our “Hypocrite-in-Chief” – who, whiles in the political wilderness, apparently couldn’t wait to get into power to give grassroots people the right to choose their local government officials, by directly electing them, and on a party political basis.

President Kufuor, having now enjoyed the same extensive powers, which yesteryear’s military dictatorship tailor-made for itself (to enable it continue to maintain its iron-grip on our country as an elected civilian regime!), for the past eight years, has no doubt discovered the massive political advantage enjoyed by the individual who serves as president, in having those same extensive powers - amongst them, the power to nominate DCE’s and some assembly members.

Being able to appoint district chief executives, has enabled our current president, like his predecessor before him, to maintain the iron-grip on our nation that the 1992 constitution was designed to give yesteryear’s military dictatorship.

The notion held by some of Ghana's educated urban elite that we are not "ready" to elect DCE's and district assembly members, really is outrageous in the extreme - for, they are important state officials at the local government level, whose actions have such a direct impact on the quality of life of rural dwellers, in a very real sense.

Why shouldn't those rural dwellers therefore elect those local government officials - as it is the only way they can ensure that those tin-gods are responsive to their needs: as opposed to the current situation in which those officials’ raison d’être, is to work hard in their district administration, to ensure that maximum political advantage accrues to the party in power at the centre, throughout their tenure in office as DCE’s?

Yes, do doubt, it is very convenient politically, to be able to distribute patronage widely, if you are a cynical politician. Any one in the position of president of Ghana, certainly has the power to do so under the 1992 constitution - which gives the incumbent endless opportunities to distribute patronage: including the power to hand over the position of DCE's to favourite party members, who can then act to hijack the distribution of projects for party political ends, for you, throughout your tenure.

How can this cynic and hypocrite claim to be a democrat - and yet be able to say such patronising things to justify the lack of democracy in our local government governance structures?

Why, do Ghana’s educated urban elite not understand that the yearning for the right to freely choose who rules them, beats as strongly in the hearts of grassroots people in rural Ghana, as it is does in that of professors of political science and economics in our university campuses, and elsewhere?

Massa, as far as the issue of democracy for grassroots people goes, one can confidently say that the stand of those who say “we are not yet ready for that yet” really is, without question, truly that of world-class moral cowards - all of whom are currently led by a president who is at the global-leadership level, in cynicism and hypocrisy. Shame on him!

Finally, when he talks about national cohesion, does he not realize that that is best promoted by our sitting presidents keeping all traditional rulers at arms length – not using the machinery of state to promote the treasonable ambitions of those traditional rulers he or she favours?

Furthermore, national unity is best served when our political parties decide to appoint regional ministers who hail from the south to serve in the north and vice versa. Ditto support the candidature of southerners living in the north to stand for election as DCE’s and vice versa.

Above all, national unity can never be promoted when we make the mistake of electing tribal supremacist politicians who lie through their teeth and fail to keep their promises to publicly declare the assets of themselves and their spouses, and to help amend the constitution to make the election of DCE’s on a party political basis, possible.

On that basis, surely, can one not say without any equivocation at all, that the election of Mr. Kufour as president of Ghana, was the biggest mistake ever made by Ghanaians?

Wednesday, 19 November 2008

Massa, let me begin by admitting that I do know that I speak and write terrible English. I also admit freely to being a nobody, a buffoon and a semi-literate.

Hopefully, that will save you the trouble of having to call me names - because what I say may not be to the liking of a distinguished and learned fellow like you, Sir!

Massa, why be so unfair to Sidney Casely-Hayford - who has shown so clearly (in his well-written article: "J.J. Rawlings, What Have You Done For Ghana Lately?" http://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/NewsArchive/artikel.php?ID=153229), that he is a man who is brave enough and cares enough about the former president (someone he so obviously respects and likes!), to put what has obviously fallen on deaf ears in the past, in the public domain: in the hope that it might perhaps trigger a response in the right direction from “he whom the cap fits"?

Massa, Sidney has shown that he is a real friend of the former president’s - and is unlike the many sycophants who unfortunately surround that once-great man who perhaps are too scared to tell him the painful truth: and who do him no good at all with their fawning and their nauseating hero-worshipping.

Yet, it could all have been so different - and the former president could have ended up, today, with an image as stellar as that of the great Madeeba, Nelson Mandela.

God above, what didn't some of us write publicly and say in private to the Victor Smiths of this world, in the past, urging the former C-i-C's inner circle and Victor himself, to let their "employers" (Mr. and Mrs. Rawlings) take the path that would put them on the right side of history in their post-retirement life - all along the very same lines Sidney suggests?

Perhaps it is still not too late, yet, Massa: the former president can do us all one last good turn by helping to bring all Ghanaian progressives together. He could help realign the Ghanaian political landscape, by dissolving the NDC (which has a negative "brand image", if truth be told!) and reversing it into the CPP.

That will be the best way of uniting all Ghanaian progressives under the banner of the party of Nkrumah, after the elections - if the ruling party succeeds in staying in power, yet again.

Perhaps when that wonderful day comes to pass, they can then approach an honest and respected man like Mr. Kofi Annan - and offer him the position of leader of the party Nkrumah founded (alas, in the end, even the great Nkrumah, was let down badly, by the dishonesty and greed, of some of his key people, was he not?).

Massa, if the progressives in Ghana do not come together, I am afraid they will find it rather difficult to dislodge the powerful crooks and greedy tribal supremacist politicians and their fellow travellers in Kokofu-football politics (the insufferable megalomaniacs from the ranks of our traditional rulers!), who now dominate the ruling party, so completely!

Incidentally (and I only say this humbly and only in matter-of-fact manner!), like Sidney, I too was “privileged' to interview the former president, once upon a time - the very first local media professional to do so after he left office.

That interview appeared in the front page of The Independent newspaper as a matter of fact. It came about because the leader of the minority in parliament, Alban Bagbin, felt that I was (at the time!) being unfair to the former president in my articles about him and their party. He believed that if I met the former president in person, I would not fail to see that he was a sincere man - who loved and cared about his country and its people.

Massa, even today, I still don’t know what to make of the former president - all these years after that plain-speaking interview: which, by the way, was cut short by a power outage at Ridge. At least that is still a recurrent feature of life under the present incompetents - into whose dishonest and greedy hands, Nkrumah’s Ghana, has now fallen.

How, typical! Awurade Nyame, with respect, when will the well-educated morons who now rule us, ever remove their buried heads from the sand? Is the reality of the outlook for our economy, going forward into the future, not a gloomy one - just as it is for virtually every other nation on the surface of the planet Earth?

Apart from those tiresome "My-party-my-tribe-right-or-wrong" myrmidons, who wear blinkers permanently and are too thick to think, and too blind to see, do even the dimmest of Ghanaians not know that the economies of all our major trading partners have fallen into a recession, already, as we speak?

So does this well-paid buffoon not know that growth rate figures for the real economy in our homeland Ghana are headed nowhere else, but south? Do these shameless incompetents and crucifiers of poor Naana Fremaa Busia, not know when to put a stop to their endless dissimulation? Have they no sense of shame, at all? Ebeeii.

Was he not the same clown who was telling us, not too long ago, that they had to sell GT in order to raise cash, to, amongst other things, pay off that company’s “debt” - which they had foolishly assumed: even after handing over an "enlarged" GT to those foreign carpetbaggers for a song?

Did they not have to pass a law indemnifying the crooks amongst those who struck that egregious example of crooked privatisation deals (a deal jam-packed with the most unethical examples of insider-dealing, ever seen in the history of corporate Ghana), so as to protect themselves: in case there is regime-change someday?

Is it not a sad reflection of their lack of nous and gumption to think that a law that so brazenly goes against the constitutional edict that requires every citizen of Ghana to fight corruption (not aid and abet it: especially in cases involving foreign carpetbaggers engaging in a rip-off of our country) can really protect those who benefitted from that deal, ever?

Was the fire-sale of GT, not a more accurate reflection of our present plight as a nation: that of a highly-geared developing nation experiencing "debt distress"? And have they not piled up a large external debt for the sole reason that the few powerful and greedy crooks who dominate the regime that has given him that cushy sinecure, were using it as a vehicle for their personal wealth creation agenda - to enable them send their already high net worth into the stratosphere?

Who doesn’t know that our forays into the capital markets of the West - ever since they graduated from seeking funds in Chinese hairdressing salons, located in the seedy backstreets of London, to the capital markets of the West - did turn out to be nice little earners for those opaque offshore companies the rogues in this regime have set up to launder their kickbacks?

Have the sundry contracted loans and bonds issued overseas not been a source of hard currency kickbacks - being their share of the massive fees their regime-crony oligarchs in our Byzantine financial services sector have been earning - in that orgy of easy-money that dipping our toes in the piranha-infested capital markets of the West, represented? God, what effrontery!

Have they not destroyed the Volta Rver Authority (VRA) - by saddling it with zillions of dollars of debt: through their idiotic energy policies? Have they not piled up yet more debt for the Tema Oil Refinety (TOR), too: despite charging fuel users surcharges that never end and are never reduced?

So just what is this well-paid sycophant waxing so lyrical about? Pure nonsense on bamboo stilts! Some of us are just so fed up with such visionless and incompetent leadership. Period.

Tuesday, 18 November 2008

Quote: “Yendi (N/R), Nov. 18, GNA – Mr. Emmanuel Ansah-Antwi, Presidential candidate of the Democratic Freedom Party (DFP) has stated that he was opposed to the suggestion that the position of a District Chief Executive (DCE) be elective. He said the current system of nominating DCEs only needed some few amendments to make the system function more efficiently. Mr Ansah-Antwi noted that the election of DCEs as proposed by the presidential candidates of the NPP, CPP, NDC and PNC at the just ended Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) debate in Tamale, would spell doom for an already polarized country.” End of quotation from GNA report.

With respect, in making that asinine statement, Mr. Emmanuel Ansah-Antwi, has just shown why he is not fit to be elected as president of Ghana. Grassroots people deserve to elect those whose actions impact directly on their lives in rural Ghana.

Just what makes some members of Ghana’s educated urban elite think that the love of freedom and the desire to live in a constitutional democracy (in which one elects those who lead the country: and at all levels!) beats any less strongly in the hearts of rural people than it does in that of our educated urban elites? What arrogance!

Democracy is not about creating a mutual admiration society, free of “polarized” positions of individuals and groups. It is, amongst other things, about competing for dominance, in a given society, of the different ideas held by political parties, about their view of the nature of society, the best means of creating and distributing wealth in that society and the ends for which political power ought to be exercised. Period.

Electing district chief executives, will, on the contrary, lessen political tensions in our country - because power will be more widely diffused in society: and the parties in opposition at the national level will feel that they too have a stake in the running of our country: since their parties will hold power too in some of the districts. What can possibly be harmful about such a development in any democracy?

Far from parties in opposition at the national level (but who wield power at the district level), sabotaging the party in power at the centre, they will rather try and turn the districts they govern, into model communities - so that they can point to those areas as examples of what they can do at the national level if they were elected to govern our nation at the centre. What can possibly be wrong with that?

Furthermore, it will create a large pool of young Ghanaians with years of executive experience, in elective office, for our nation. Is that not a plus for entrenching democracy even further in our country?

In any case, if we do not ever try it, how can we possibly say that “it will not work in Ghana, because we are not ready for that yet” (as the cynics who say they believe in democracy, but don’t think grassroots people deserve democracy too, keep telling us)? When such people say that “it will not work” - not work for whose benefit, precisely, do they mean, I ask, dear reader?

The 1992 constitution was specifically designed to enable a military dictator to metamorphose into an elected civilian president - and continue wielding the same extensive powers he had as a military dictator: and dominate our country completely, as he had done before the advent of constitutional rule.

It was not created with the democratic right of ordinary grassroots people to elect district chief executives and district assembly members, in mind. Those for whom it was created, tailor-made it, to give legitimacy, to an elected and continuing dictatorship. Period

Finally, if the Ghana News Agency (GNA) quotes him correctly, when its reports that : ”Mr. Asante-Antwi said he would place the Department of Births and Deaths under chiefs and give them the mandate to register all births in the country”, then he simply is not fit to be elected to run even the smallest hamlet in our nation.

Inherited privilege, in any society, is the greatest enemy of those seeking to create a meritocracy in their nation - which is why all the societies of the developed world, got rid of feudalism, in their march towards progress. We must aim to rid ourselves of the baleful influence of traditional rulers in Ghanaian society - not empower them to mess up our country.

Chiefs owe their positions to inherited privilege and are part of a traditional system that thrived in a milieu steeped in superstition and which deliberately kept the masses ignorant - so that they could serve their rulers as hewers of wood and drawers of water.

It was a system deliberately designed to provide the ruling elite with a large pool of ignoramuses - from whose midst some young men could be used and abused, by being deliberately plied with alcohol to numb their brains, so that even when sober, they would still be happy to serve others as “Ahenkwas”: forever willing to carry their fellow human beings (dressed up to the nines!), in palanquins.

Ghanaians are a people who aspire to use their country’s new-found oil and natural gas wealth to transform their society into Africa’s equivalent of the egalitarian societies of Scandinavia - not return to the pre-colonial days of slavery: when traditional rulers held sway and were the top-dogs in a feudal society in which ordinary people were groomed to have the mentality of serfs - to ensure the continued dominance of those who believed they were born to enslave others less privileged than themselves.

The elitist, retrogressive and outrageous views held by the Asante-Antwis of this country, must never be allowed to prevail in Ghanaian society, ever - not in the modern African nation-state founded by that great pan-Africanist and visionary, Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah: who believed in the good sense and heroism of the common people of our country.

Ordinary people demand to elect their rulers at all levels, and on a party political basis, including district assembly members and district chief executives. Period.

Thanks for your email, Opanin. Yes, how very typical - and isn't it a hoot? It rings so true too, doesn’t it? It really is just the sort of thing a 419 fraudster operating out of some dingy little internet café somewhere in Lagos would dream up: and shame the rest of the mostly honest and hardworking compatriots of his/her's, who unfortunately, invariably get lumped together with online crooks like that!

Incidentally, I have actually been mulling over an article I intend to write, entitled: "Letter to Michelle Obama" - and in which I will ask her to make sure that her husband keeps Africa and her leaders at arms length: if they do not want to be embarrassed by our political and business elites.

In that email, I will point it out to her that the best thing (and the only thing!) that they can do for Africa, is simply to let the CIA fish out the details of the secret bank accounts of the opaque offshore companies through which Africa's ruling elites launder their stolen billions: and publish same to disclose what they actually hold to the whole wide world, on the internet!

Wouldn't that change the face of African politics, overnight - and for the better, permanently? Africa does not need more financial aid - the ordinary people of Africa only need help to enable them close the overseas bank accounts of their rulers: and the return of the stolen monies they contain to the nations of the continent. Period.

Can you imagine the zillions Paul Kagame and his crowd in power in Kigali, have probably made, thus far, from the misery being inflicted on the citizens of Eastern DR Congo, on Rwanda's behalf, by the self-styled and narcissistic "General" Nkunda, coming to light in such a manner? Wouldn’t that help loosen their iron-grip on their country - the only apartheid state left in Africa, today: and an injustice a world enfeebled by political correctness, has closed its eyes to?

Just look at how over the years (ever since Paul Kagame made a beeline for the mines of DR Eastern DR Congo, instead of pursuing the remnants of the Hutu-dominated Rwandan army that his Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) forces had routed, in 1996), they have callously used the insecurity they have created through Nkunda’s rebellion, as a smokes-screen: to enable them loot the mineral wealth of Eastern DR Congo with total impunity.

They have not stopped once to think about the plight of the millions of helpless innocents whose lives their unfathomable greed has destroyed. Kagame and Nkunda have acted without a care about the untold misery and abominable acts of cruelty that the ordinary citizens of the Kivus have to endure, on a daily basis.

Perfect! O, Awurade Nyame, if only our "Hypocrite-in-Chief" had travelled around Africa a great deal more during his tenure! Just imagine, dear reader, the many opportunities he could have opened up for Ghana's private sector businesses, by now.

For example, for this particular trip to Liberia, if he were to take members of the Ghana Real Estate Developers Association (GREDA) along with him, could he not recommend their services to Liberia’s president?

If he were to do that, is it not possible that some of them would be able to win contracts to build public housing there, for example - as well as have the opportunity to replicate their business models there: by setting up subsidiaries of their companies there?

Is that not a far better way to proceed in empowering Ghana’s private sector? If he had concentrated on Africa, would we not be seeing Ghanaian banks, hoteliers, sundry food processing firms, computer software firms, ditto computer training companies, etc., etc., with company footprints across Africa, as wide as that of ECOBANK, for example?

One certainly hopes that the next president, will concentrate on developing commercial ties between Ghana's private sector and the rest of Africa - and travel around Africa doing so: instead of taking pride in being a stooge for neo-colonialism and a lackey of Western commercial interests.

It is that kind of unfortunate mindset (taking pride in being a stooge for neo-colonialism and a lackey of Western commercial interests!) that leads some of our leaders to waste taxpayers’ money travelling to the developed capitalist nations of the Western world - where nations like ours aren't really taken seriously by the major players in their business world, if truth be told.

By definition, dear reader, any nation where racism is institutionalized isn’t going to take Ghana seriously - and the only reason why they humour and tolerate our rulers is simply to make it possible for them to have influence over our country: to enable them exploit it successfully! It is such a pity that the foolish pride of some our leaders blinds them to this simple truth. Hmmm, Ghana – eyeasem oo: asem ebaba debi ankasa!

May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!

Monday, 17 November 2008

I was astonished to hear some of the reasons Dr. Arthur Kennedy gave on Metro TV’s “Good Morning Ghana” breakfast show (telecast on Monday 17th November 2008), in seeking to justify the president’s unnecessary trips abroad.

How can that gentleman possibly say that the president had to travel to the country’s which forgave Ghana’s external debt, because (to paraphrase him) the people, who forgave us the debt, don’t live in Ghana? Does Dr. Arthur Kennedy seriously think that those nations that forgave us our debt did so because of President Kufuour’s endless and unnecessary travels abroad?

Perhaps Dr. Kennedy has come to believe in his own party’s never-ending dissimulation? Well, in case he does not realise it, his party, like most of our largely clueless political class, neither had the nous or the gumption, in the 1990’s, when some of us were fighting for debt relief (because we believed, correctly, that that was the only way that our economies could ever experience sustained growth), to join us in the fight to get our country (and others like it, across Africa!) a fresh start: and a fighting chance at achieving sustained economic growth.

The truth of the matter is that they are mere beneficiaries of other people’s steadfastness, foresight and creative thinking. Yet, today, the greed of the powerful few crooks who dominate his party, and who have benefitted enormously from the large debt they have succeeded in piling up again, has ended up taking us right back to square one.

We are now more or less suffering from the same “debt distress” that was squeezing the very lifeblood out of our country during the tenure of the previous regime and before our debts were cancelled - yet, this latter-day Goebbels seeks to put a spin on this outrage. Incredible!

He also talked (smoothly and glibly as he is wont to do!) about the public procurement law, now in place, as yet another achievement of his party. What effrontery!

Is he not the recipient of a contract awarded without public tendering from the ministry of health, as we speak - something that flies in the face of that very law: and a contract that no ethical politician in any nation whose public life is underpinned by an ethos of common decency, in his position (and in the course of an election campaign to boot, too!) would have accepted or sought?

Was it not simply a cynical way for his party to provide him with income at Ghana’s expense - because his party had to compensate him for staying on in Ghana to help in their election campaign (after his failed bid for his party’s presidential candidature), rather than returning to his work in the US?

And to cap all that nonsense on bamboo stilts, that insufferable and arrogant Steven Asamoah-Boateng, then called in to the programme, to tell us that Zoomlion was all over Ghana - cleaning the country. Does that uncouth buffoon not ever go out - and if he does, is he so blind that he is unable to see that our towns and cities are slowly being engulfed by filth? What perfidy!

Do they not understand that even the dimmest Ghanaians know that Zoomlion is their regime’s equivalent of the NDC regime’s leading and favourite, regime-crony oligarch’s "ordained-and-blessed" private-sector company, J. Stanley Owusu and Co.?

Does he not know that we all know that it was created when his party hit on the bright idea of creating their own contractors, to whom contracts could be awarded in exchange for kickbacks - as we were duly informed by no less a person than one of their party’s many ex-chairpersons, Mr. Haruna Esseku? Just what do some of our politicians take us for? Fools? God give us patience!

Whereas in the past many writers were harassed and some even jailed, today’s methods are far more subtle: the powerful rogues amongst our rulers, have simply bought the conscience of many once-critical writers – and as a consequence, today, sadly, far too many writers are in the pockets of those who rule our homeland Ghana.

Thus, today, we are all witnesses to the unedifying spectacle, of many media professionals and media houses, who are supposed to be society's watchdogs, who have ended up becoming the ruling regime's guard-dogs.

The truth of the matter is that both the methods of yesteryear and today's methods are designed to achieve exactly the same end - kill freedom of expression in our country: in order to stop the truth about the abuse of power and corruption in high places from coming to light.

Nothing really has changed in the Ghanaian nation-state - the powerful crooks who have dominated all the regimes we have had ruling us since the return of constitutional rule in 1992, have all been out to stifle dissenting opinion in our country: to enable them “chop Ghana, small” (to quote an infamous phrase, immortalized by a prosperous Lebanese crook, who was in the lucrative business, of the rip-off, of our country) with impunity. Pity!

With respect, Opanin, I only responded to Mr. Benjamin Tawiah’s article entitled: “Rawlings’ Caucasian Blood Helped His Integrity: Says Nigerian Author” which you mentioned, and which appeared in the general news web page of www.ghanaweb.com on 16th November, 2008, for one reason only.

Massa, I commented on it, simply because the gentleman who wrote it, said he was a “freelance journalist.” Opanin, I was merely doing my duty by him, in pointing out his error to him - as a concerned fellow-journalist.

Yes, I agree with you perfectly Opanin, in what you say, when you imply that it is important that those who comment publicly on issues that affect the well-being of our country, are not needlessly partisan in the opinions they express.

However, I am not biased in my writing at all, in my humble opinion - and there are countless articles of mine in the public domain, to prove that I am not partisan when I write: especially as regards the issue of corruption amongst our political class.

For example, in the past, I have pointed out the fact that it is patently clear to all discerning and independent-minded Ghanaians, today, that if those who rescued the hero of 4th June, 1979, from his Special Branch cell at dawn, on the morning of 4th June, 1979, had had the slightest inkling, that nearly two decades down the road, Flt. Lt. Rawlings, would be telling Ghanaians the astonishing story, that "friends" of his, were paying for the education and living expenses, overseas, of his children, they would have definitely left him to his own devices - to face the music for his failed insurrection of 9th May, 1979, alone.

Massa, I am quiet sure that if you were to ask Major Boakye-Djan today, he would, indeed, confirm what I say!

I have also said publicly, that after the military uprising in 1979, if General Acheampong (may his soul rest in peace) and the other senior officers who were executed by the former president and his colleagues, who formed the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC), had said that "friends" of theirs were making the same kind of payments that the former president now tells us his "friends" are on his (General Akyeampong's) behalf, Flt Lt Rawlings and Co would have been apoplectic - and probably summarily executed them on the spot: for telling them such a Kweku Ananse story.

Surely, that is not the sort of thing a biased writer (especially one writing the way I did in my response to Mr. Benjamin Tawiah's piece), in a land full of sycophants, would write publicly, is it, Opanin?

Massa, I am a simple pan-Africanist, a humble Nkrumaist, a committed Ghanaian patriot and nationalist - not one of those "My-party-my-tribe-right-or-wrong" myrmidons, who wear blinkers permanently: and are too thick to think and too blind to see, because their consciences have been bought by our political class (from across the spectrum). Peace and blessings to you, Opanin.

Sunday, 16 November 2008

Quote: "By Benjamin Tawiah: The author is a freelance journalist; he lives in Ottawa, Canada." End of quotation.

Exactly - the "author" does indeed live in faraway Canada not Ghana. Perhaps if he lived in Ghana he could have taken a short walk past the former president's Ridge residence - and counted the number of houses there: two, precisely. Not five!

One of the two very ordinary-looking houses, serves as his family's home - and the other his office. Massa, for the record, the former president does not live in "a plush complex boasting five houses." Period.

Massa, with respect, if you want to be taken seriously as a "freelance journalist", do endeavour to get your facts right - as it does your reputation no good at all to make such needless (and basic!) factual errors. That - and being fair and balanced, always - will get you far, in your chosen profession. So do take note of that, please. Haaba!

Finally, Opanin, may I humbly point it out to you, that there are many Africans (both in the continent, and in the Diaspora), who might say to you that Africans of the 21st century, ought to have enough self-belief, not to allow themselves to be influenced by those negative-minded Africans, whose own sense of inferiority, makes them deprecate everything African?

Opanin, there is no innate difference in intelligence between the races - and neither is there a scientific basis for suggesting or implying that race has anything to do with the level of personal integrity members of the different races that make up the one human race have. That is arrant nonsense as many factors go into shaping the character of indivuduals whatever their race might be.

Yes, there are some Africans who are less honest than the members of other races - just as there are some members of other races who are less honest than some Africans.

Massa, try and see beyond stereotypes - if you want to be a good “freelance journalist.” Is Botswana's ruling elite not as honest as that found in the developed nations of the Western world - such as that of Canada for example? Are they not Africans, too? Get it? Se mu ekotina abrokyire a, eyaa mu enje muhu endi kakra. Haaba. Hmmm, Ghana - eyeasem oo!

May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long freedom! Long live Ghana!

Friday, 14 November 2008

According to a 14 November 2008 Ghana News Agency report, “Ghana's debt, including contingent liability from COCOBOD, at the end of last September stood at US$ 7,652.46 million, Dr Anthony Akoto Osei, a Minister of State at the Ministry of Finance has told Parliament.”

The same report went on to say that: ”The debt, he said, was made up of US$3,990.38 for external, including that of the COCOBOD of US$ 118.75 million, and a domestic debt of US$ 3,662.” (End of quotation from GNA report.)

That genius, Dr Anthony Akoto Osei , who is our minister of state at the ministry of finance, is a gentleman, who owes his cushy sinecure to the nepotism of our “Hypocrite-in-Chief ” - and his irritating, disgraceful and divisive “Kokofu-football” politics.

Well, knowing the tactics of the current crowd, now in power in our country today, one just hopes that the phrase COCOBOD's "contingent liability" is not a euphemism designed to hide any super-fat fees (surely not as much as US$ 118.75 millions?) charged by the consortium of overseas banks, which arranged a hard currency loan (was it not nearly a billion dollars or thereabouts - if my poor old memory serves me right?) for the COCOBOD to purchase cocoa, locally, with.

Anyway, there are a number of this regime’s critics, who say (uncharitably perhaps?), that Dr. Akoto Osei was sent to that ministry, to make sure that the powerful rogues who dominate this regime, would be able to take advantage of the many opportunities that come Ghana’s way, for empowering its private sector, from overseas - and keep his sponsors au fait with such golden opportunities: as well as generally smoothen the path of the regime-crony oligarchs in whose deep pockets some of our rulers are ensconced, as they work hard to send their personal net worth into the stratosphere.

Sadly, and as usual, the geniuses on the opposition benches in parliament, missed yet another opportunity to nail the rogues into whose hands our nation has fallen - and finally force them to tell all of us, precisely how much our now heavily-indebted nation, is having to make, in regular interest payments, to those prescient overseas investors, who piled into the US$ 750 millions sovereign bonds, this regime issued overseas.

They must now make amends and ask exactly what this regime's sovereign bond regular interest payment plan is: and precisely what all that money was used for. Above all , they must demand to know, if it was used to create wealth that will generate revenues for our country, going forward, into the future: or if it was merely used to fund the extravagant lifestyles of our rulers – such as supporting their wanderlust-addiction habit.

They must do the same thing, too, as regards the GT corporate bonds, issued in London, on that company’s behalf, by Iroko: in that most egregious of examples of insider-dealing ever seen in the history of corporate Ghana.

Whiles they are at it, they must also ask that very honest gentleman, to break down, item by item, the US$72 millions in "other costs" that not too long ago, he proposed to subtract from projected borrowed money (some US$300 plus to repay GT'S "debt", if my memory serves me right!).

Once upon a time, dear reader, they apparently intended to saddle this and future generations of Ghanaians and their country, with yet another loan - in the hope of getting their usual hard currency kickbacks, from their regime-crony oligarchs in our financial services sector (according to some of their critics, i.e.!).

This was before the global credit crunch (in the aftermath of the meltdown in the financial markets of the West), when they felt they were the masters of the universe - and were talking glibly about raising some US$300 plus millions in the capital markets of the West, to repay GT's "debt"!

Curiously (and to the astonishment of the foreign carpetbaggers, apparently!), it is rumoured that this government, was so desperate to seal the deal (no doubt to save their “blushes” – nudge, nudge, wink, wink!), that it took it upon itself, to remove from GT’s wealthy suitor’s massive shoulders, that debt, which Iroko inveigled GT into burdening itself with, when the greedy rogues in this regime, struck that infamous takeover deal.

Yet, as it became obvious to many, shortly after the deal, Iroko issued those bonds on GT's behalf, without the company's managers having any clear idea of a solid revenue stream-providing product, to guarantee that the company would still remain stable financially, even as the regular repayments, which had to be made to those clever overseas investors, who bought the bonds as a good source of regular income, were made. So why did our nation have to assume that debt too? Can it not be argued that Iroko was criminally negligent in its role as the issuing house, to a certain extent? Incredible!

Apparently (according to the bush telegraph, i.e.!), the local professional advisors of the foreign carpetbaggers, who bought that stake in the company, are rumoured to have only got their clients to agree to the deal, after they got the government to agree it would pass a law indemnifying them from any future prosecution - to protect people from their side from any collateral damage: in case regime-change occurred as a result of the December 2008 elections.

Poor fools: Why, were those super-expensive local corporate lawyers they hired and paid zillions to, not decent enough, to tell them, that far from conferring immunity on any unethical actions, that law actually is an illegality - as our constitution enjoins all Ghanaians to fight corruption: not aid and abet foreign carpetbaggers, out to rip-off mother Ghana? Amazing!

They will “smell pepper” one day, for sure - to use our "Hypocrite-in-Chief’s” favourite crude phrase: "deployed" when he is feeling on top of the world and thinks he is invincible because he is Commander-in-Chief of our military and monarch of all he surveys in our homeland Ghana. Poor soul!

What power did his predecessor not have, once upon a time, I ask, dear reader? At a certain point in time, was he not the hero of June 4th 1979, no less? Well, today, what power does that poor, angry old man with an unhealthy beer-paunch, have? Incidentally, forgetting that Napoleon Bonaparte was height-challenged too, our sadly now much-discredited hero of 4th June, 1979 apparently thinks that short people don’t amount to much!

But I digress, dear reader. If even the smallest primary school children in our country today, know that in issuing bonds overseas, one must always have a plan that clearly outlines the sources from whence bond-issuing parties intend making regular payments to investors who buy those bonds one issues, why then are our opposition parliamentarians not asking the right questions about our unacceptably large external debt today?

Exactly when are the geniuses on the opposition benches in parliament going to ask this incompetent regime, precisely what plans they had in place, to enable them meet the regular interest payments on both classes of bonds, so far issued overseas: i.e. the sovereign bonds and the GT corporate bonds (if that too was shifted unto our nation’s shoulders - in that “one-way-street” deal, i.e.!)?

Have the opposition members not heard the bush-telegraph story that some of the clever politicians ruling us today, took a strategic decision to use overseas loans and bond issues as their preferred personal wealth creation vehicle - garnering hard currency kickbacks from the super-fat fees earned by their cronies in Ghana's financial services sector: the politically well-connected "deal-makers"?

Do they not know that it is the process through which they are said to have received kickbacks from the regime-crony oligarchs, those well-connected and powerful Ghanaian financial services sector Titans, who are said to have shared their super-fat fees with them: which is why they have piled up so much debt in such a relatively short time, since they graduated from Chinese hairdressing salons in the seedy backstreets of London, to the piranha-infested waters of the capital markets of the West?

Let the opposition wake up from its slumber - and pose the right questions in parliament, for once. Henceforth, let the VALCO fiasco be their eternal guide - and act to protect the interests of our country, at all times, going forward, into the future. Haba!

Those of us who wrote publicly against the idea of hedging that was mooted by some of our geniuses, as a way to protect our country from the spikes in the price of oil, were aghast that the opposition did not point it out to the well-educated morons who came up with the idea, that that was what ruined the now-defunct Ashanti Goldfields, in the end. They must stop overlooking such lunacies, in future, too.

Thursday, 13 November 2008

Quotation from the Chronicle newspaper (Wednesday, 12 November 2008): “The Trade Minister cautioned that the deal was very sensitive and that newspaper reports could force the consortium to back out from the deal. “My friend, we don’t want to lose this deal, it is a very sensitive matter,” Hon Owusu-Ankomah elaborated. He indicated that officials were briefing a joint committee of parliament, which consisted of both members of the majority and minority on the level of the development of the agreement, which was recently signed."

“He said, elsewhere such deals are shrouded in secrecy until it was sealed, but because the government wanted to be transparent, it sent the agreement to parliament and thereby making it public. He called on Ghanaians not to panic and that everything was under control...” End of quotation.

What perfidy! Is the US government’s current dealing with companies in that great nation’s financial services sector shrouded in secrecy? Is the search for a buyer for Alitalia, even in the land of the boorish “sun-tanned” Mafioso, enveloped in a miasma of mystery? Pure nonsense on bamboo stilts! Just what do these well-educated morons take us for, I ask, dear reader?

When Mr. Owusu-Ankomah says: ”My friend, we don’t want to lose this deal, it is a very sensitive matter...” precisely what does this too-clever-by-half gentleman mean? That, they are still trying to inveigle two ethically-run multinationals (who clearly aren’t interested in buying VALCO, whatever Mssrs. Owusu-Ankomah & Co. might say to the contrary!), into naming their terms, whatever they are: and be rewarded with VALCO, for a song, by a desperate government of Ghana - now anxious not to lose face, perhaps?

Well, there are those who might also say that what he really means is that the regime-crony oligarchs (or as the uncharitable might say, the well-connected crooks: the high net worth ”connection-men/women” who front for the few powerful rogues, who dominate this regime!), whom his colleague, the minister for parliamentary affairs, Mr. Benjamin Osei Aidoo, referred disdainfully to (in the barbed phrase: ”...If it turns out that the other party or the person or agent ... did not have the mandate, that’s a matter between the Ghana government and that other party..."), are now trying a last-ditch attempt, to salvage the deal - and preserve their ever-so lucrative “finder’s-fees” and their 10 per cent kickbacks: and save the government of which they are such prominent members, from any loss of face.

The Chronicle also says, in referring to the genial genius we have as our trade and industry minister: “He said, elsewhere such deals are shrouded in secrecy until it was sealed, but because the government wanted to be transparent, it sent the agreement to parliament and thereby making it public. He called on Ghanaians not to panic and that everything was under control."

Since Mr. Owusu-Ankomah says the government wants to be “transparent” about this shabby deal, can he tell us who are the lucky individual/s that his colleague the minister for parliamentary affairs, Mr. Benjamin Osei Aidoo, refers disdainfully to, when he said: ”...If it turns out that the other party or the person or agent ... did not have the mandate, that’s a matter between the Ghana government and that other party..."?

What exactly was the “mandate” of those blessed and incompetent, regime crony-oligarchs, who brokered this deal? Was it to do their usual thing - to go and look for carpetbaggers overseas, whom they could form a secret joint-venture with, using their usual special purpose vehicles, those opaque offshore companies: through which they launder their sundry privatisation "finders-fees" and usual 10 per cent kickbacks, in a deal cloaked with respectability, which was signed, sealed and delivered, as a "consortium" (and in this case christened “International Aluminum Partners”, no less)?

The trouble about this regime, more so than any other regime we have had in our chequered 51-year history, is that many of its members actually don’t seem to remember that wise Ghanaian saying: ”No condition is permanent.” Has Mr. Owusu-Ankomah forgotten just how powerful the former president was, once upon a time, in our history? What power does he have today? Zilch!

When they start acting as if they think that they are invincible because today they control the security apparatus, let them cast their minds back to the Kalabule-era that presaged the events of the 4th June 1979 military uprising - and recall just how the well-connected regime-crony oligarchs of yesteryear, were also grabbing everything in the land they could lay their grubby hands on. Well, how did that lot end up – and where did the unfathomable greed that drove them, land some of them, finally?

Our politicians must understand that they can fool some of the people all the time (especially those tiresome “My-party-my-tribe-right-or-wrong” myrmidons: who wear blinkers permanently - and are too thick to think, and too blind to see!), but they can never fool all the people of Ghana, all the time.

Wednesday, 12 November 2008

Massa, with respect, although the crooks in this regime were successful with Vodafone, it was really just a lucky break for them - and even in that particular deal, they were successful, only after they gave the assuarance that they would pass a law indemnifying those involved in the deal, from being prosecuted in future, for the unethical things that went on in that shabby deal, which was full of insider-dealing of the very worst kind.

The fact of the matter, is that the majority of Western companies are mostly underpined by corporate good governance principles – especially those whose shares are traded on reputable stock exchanges. Consequently, they do not play silly games that could end up damaging their reputation: simply in order to "beat down shares “ and “play a little politics with issues" (as you unfortunately put it!) for that purpose.

Massa, that is precisely because their executives know the eventual results of such unethical corporate governance practices (especially those perpetrated against poor developing nations in Africa): their institutional shareholders and regulators, in their own home countries, will take them to task.

Why do you think that in the aftermath of the takeover by Anglogold of Ashanti Goldfields, the board of that company, meeting in London, turned down a request for payment of half a million pounds sterling, to the important local personage, who was instrumental in Anglogold eventually beating Randgold: and successfully taking over Ashanti Goldfields?

Perhaps you ought to read the words of the minister for parliamentary affairs, Mr. Benjamin Osei Aidoo, who, in asking that parliament should not to be blamed for the ‘fraud’, is reported to have said: “For us, we were mandated to approve of an agreement [between] two parties, one of them being the Ghana government...If it turns out that the other party or the person or agent ... did not have the mandate, that’s a matter between the Ghana government and that other party."

In other words, he was passing the buck, Massa - and thus protecting himself from any future “collateral damage” that might emanate from this deal. Like the deal with Mrs. Cotton, which landed some people from the previous regime in jail, some people in this regime, too, will land in prison, someday, for this outrageous and shabby fraud, against Ghana.

A key factor in the bad luck for the crooks in the ruling regime that pushed this fraudulent deal is that Norske Hydro and VALE both have very proactive home national governments that care about nations like ours, and will not tolerate any rip-off of our country carried out by companies legally domiciled in their jurisdictions.

In any other jurisdiction, heads would be rolling by now as a result of such a major scandal - fraud that actually ended up in a whole national parliament passing a law it should have never passed if they were more vigilant and protective of the national interest. This is a very serious matter - and someday those who pushed this shabby deal will be jailed for it, as sure as day follows night: you mark my words, Massa.

What we should now get the minority side in parliament to do, is to quickly get the relevant parliamentary committee to find out if any asset-stripping has gone on in VALCO - which has a very valuable property portfolio that contains some of the most desirous residential properties in Tema.

We must ensure that the few powerful and greedy crooks who dominate this regime, and whose greed apparently knows no bounds, have not succeeded (and do not succeed!) in getting VALCO to sell them some of its properties: especially for values far below prevailing market rates. God - what a country: do these greedy people know no shame at all? Incredible!